Friday, August 27, 2021
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Heat: Survey found most workers
not aware of the new rules
Continued from Page 1
are “in progress,” according
to Oregon OSHA.
The PCUN survey found
that most workers, however,
were not aware of the new
rules and had not been trained
by their employer. “That part
seemed to be lacking a lot,”
Lopez said.
Another gap, Lopez said,
is whether workers are willing
to take safety breaks. While
hourly workers said they had
no problem with rest periods,
piece rate workers paid based
on how much they harvest
were less willing.
“Every minute they
weren’t out there, it meant
money lost,” she said.
Jenny Dresler, a lob-
byist for the Oregon Farm
Bureau, said the biggest
challenge for farms boils
down to timing.
“Particularly
family
farms and ranches, what
I’m hearing is just a sense
of being overwhelmed and
overloaded,” she said. “We
are asking the world of these
small employers, and giv-
ing them very little time to
accomplish what is man-
dated in each of these rules.”
For example, Dresler said
farms in Southern Oregon
were struggling to find N95
masks on short notice as the
AQI rose above 200 because
of nearby wildfires.
“I was just getting endless
calls saying they couldn’t
find these masks,” she said.
“People just panicked.”
Lesley Tamura, who
grows 42 acres of pears at
her family’s orchard near
Hood River, Ore., said the
rules are also costing money,
such as buying window air
conditioners for workers liv-
ing in on-farm housing.
“Because the rules are
constantly changing ... it’s
definitely difficult to keep
up, and it’s definitely a
financial burden,” Tamura
said. “At the same time, we
have to figure out what we
can realistically do to protect
(workers).”
Ban: ‘Today, we celebrate this
huge victory alongside the men
and women who harvest our food’
Continued from Page 1
repeatedly made commit-
ments to abide by science,
yet the EPA decision on
chlorpyrifos strays from that
commitment and takes away
an important tool to manage
pests and insects,” Duvall
said in a statement.
“The integrity of the reg-
istration review process
and commitment to using
sound science must be pri-
oritized in a decision of such
far-reaching consequences,”
he said.
With the EPA reluctant to
declare all uses of chlorpyr-
ifos unsafe, many environ-
mental and labor groups
continued to press for a ban
through the 9th Circuit. The
court in April issued another
order to EPA prodding the
agency to ban chlorpyrifos.
“Today, we celebrate this
huge victory alongside the
men and women who harvest
our food, who have waited
too long for a ban on this pes-
ticide,” United Farm Work-
ers President Teresa Romero
said in a statement.
Online: ‘Once COVID hit, we really had to change our way of doing auctions’
Continued from Page 1
decision to go fully virtual,
investing in a state-of-the-art
production studio at its Wash-
ougal facility.
“Once COVID hit, we
really had to change our way
of doing auctions,” Steen-
dam said. “That’s where
we’ve had to evolve to what
we have here now.”
Online trend
JSA is part of a burgeon-
ing trend of auction compa-
nies that have either added
online options or switched
entirely to digital formats
for their agricultural equip-
ment sales. Industry experts
say the pandemic has sped
up that technological shift as
large, in-person gatherings
were banned.
Despite the upheaval,
Steendam said JSA expects
to double its revenue by
reaching more buyers, with
registered bidders in all 50
U.S. states and 30 countries.
“We want to go from
regional to national to
worldwide,” Steendam said.
Stepping into the JSA
studio itself is like going
through a time warp. The
exterior is a replica Old West
town, complete with rustic
bath house, jail, saloon and
horse-drawn carriages.
But inside the faded
wooden “bank” building is a
21st century studio with six
cameras, bright lights and
anchor desk illuminated by
four wall-mounted screens.
Steendam said the goal
is to bring high-end produc-
tion values not previously
seen in equipment auctions.
He compared their now-
monthly broadcasts to those
run by the collector car
company, Barrett-Jackson,
which televises auctions all
over the U.S.
“We believe we’re the
only ones doing this right
now in the heavy equipment
world,” Steendam said,
referring to the unique stu-
dio setup.
Even before the pan-
demic, JSA had a virtual
component in its live events.
Bidders could use one of two
online platforms — Prox-
ibid and Equipment Facts
— to participate alongside
those who were at the auc-
tion yard.
JSA has since added a
third platform, BidSpotter,
to the mix and committed to
the live virtual format. The
first auction in the new stu-
dio was April 21, broadcast
over the three online plat-
forms as well as YouTube
and Facebook Live.
The auction host and auc-
tioneer sit at the main anchor
desk, calling the action in
real time while four “ring
men” representing Proxi-
bid, Equipment Facts, Bid-
Spotter and absentee bidders
field bids coming in from
anywhere in the world.
Behind the scenes, a
director in the control room
runs the broadcast and airs a
pre-recorded video of each
piece of equipment as it
reaches the auction block.
“We want to show every-
thing working on screen,”
Steendam said.
Buyers can also still
visit the yards in Spokane
and Washougal up to three
days before auction day
and check the equipment in
person.
“We still get people come
preview day,” he said, “but
the fact is that they don’t
have to wake up at 6 a.m.,
Getty Images
Online sales may be gaining in popularity, but Hannes Combest, CEO of the National Auctioneers Association, says she believes there will al-
ways be a place for the classic, live auction.
Live auctions
J. Stout Auctions
A recent virtual auction hosted by J. Stout Auctions. Bidders use one of three platforms, including Proxibid, Bid-
Spotter and Equipment Facts, to purchase heavy equipment and agricultural machinery.
come down to the
auction yard and
wait for an hour to
five hours. Now they
can (bid) at home, or
in their truck, or in
their office. There’s
no disruption to their
day.”
son, the company’s
sales director for the
U.S. West, which
includes an auction
yard in Chehalis,
Wash.
Before the pan-
Scott
demic nixed large
Musser
gatherings, Johnson
estimated 70% of
Higher prices
sales were already online.
Greater
convenience The switch to online-only
means more people can par- happened over one week-
ticipate, which in turn helps end in March 2020, and the
fetch higher prices for items number of registered bid-
at auction, according to data. ders has since increased
“It’s purely mathemati- 44% for auctions at Cheha-
cal,” said Scott Musser, of lis, he said.
Musser Bros. Auctions in
“We went from having
Pasco, Wash., which has an auction with in-person
been conducting auctions bidders to next week we
online for years. “More were fully online,” Johnson
checkbooks equals more said. “Bidder registrations
money. Anything we can do were going up. ... It made
to engage our audience and us realize this was defi-
make it more convenient for nitely successful. Not only
our bidders to participate is a could we logistically do it,
but we were seeing things
good thing.”
One of the largest equip- gain steam.”
ment auction houses in the
On Aug. 18, Ritchie
country, Ritchie Bros. Auc- Bros. released its latest
tioneers, has seen the same market trends report, which
trend since it went fully vir- shows higher prices for all
tual last year.
types of equipment.
Ritchie Bros. began
For U.S. customers,
offering online options to its prices for large earthmoving
live auctions as far back as equipment were up 8% over
2002. Since then, online par- 2020 for the three-month
ticipation has grown expo- period ending July 31.
nentially, said Matt John-
Prices for medium earth-
moving equipment and skid
steer loaders were up 27%,
up 31% for truck tractors
that pull trailers and up 26%
for vocational trucks such as
dump trucks.
“I would expect that we
would see this trend con-
tinue,” Johnson said.
‘Total paradigm shift’
In 2009-10, while pres-
ident of the National Auc-
tioneers
Association,
Musser predicted that
more than half of all per-
sonal property auctions
would be online by 2015.
It was a bold take, he
said, and one that earned
him some blowback at the
time.
“I think I was dead on,”
Musser said in a recent
interview.
The forecast was based
on what he was seeing at
his family-owned busi-
ness, which has auc-
tion yards in Washing-
ton, Idaho, Wyoming and
Montana.
Musser Bros. started
simulcasting live auc-
tions on the internet in
the mid-2000s. By 2013,
the company had started
conducting all of its sales
online.
“We had already seen a
dramatic shift in the dig-
ital space,” he said. “It’s
been a total paradigm
shift in our industry and
our business.”
About six years ago,
Musser had an epiph-
any.
He
remembers
talking with a farmer in
the Columbia Basin who
described how he was able
to bid on equipment while
sitting on his John Deere
sprayer in the middle of a
corn field.
“That’s why we do
it,” he said. “These guys,
they’re busy, they’re run-
ning crews. They don’t
have time to come stand
around all day at an
auction.”
Musser estimates the
move to online-only led
to a tripling in the num-
ber of registered bidders
for Musser Bros. Today, he
said 74% of their customers
bid directly on their smart-
phones, which he described
as “mind-bending.”
The
pandemic
has
accelerated the adoption of
many companies going to
an online model by sheer
force, Musser added.
“When COVID hit, we
really didn’t miss a beat,”
he said. “We were already
there.”
Online sales may be
gaining in popularity, but
Hannes Combest, CEO of the
National Auctioneers Associ-
ation, said she believes there
will always be a place for the
classic, live auction.
“I know there are more
and more going to online auc-
tions everyday,” Combest
said. “There are certain times
and places, though, where the
live auction will never disap-
pear. It’s great fun, and it’s a
great business transaction.”
The association, based in
Overland Park, Kan., rep-
resents 2,900 auctioneers
nationwide spanning a vari-
ety of commodities, from
equipment and real estate to
intellectual property. Accord-
ing to the NAA, over a quar-
ter-trillion dollars in goods
and services are sold at auc-
tion every year in the U.S.
Combest said auction-
eers have done a fabulous
job adapting technology
to weather the pandemic.
However, certain types of
in-person events such as
galas, benefits and non-
profit fundraisers still have
their place.
“People enjoy it so much.
It’s a great way to do busi-
ness. It’s very transparent,”
she said. “You can still gen-
erate excitement through
online auctions, but it’s not
necessarily the same excite-
ment of a live auction.”
Musser agreed that live
auctions will continue to
thrive for specialty events.
But for commodity-type pur-
chases, like farm equipment
and implements, he sees no
going back — at least not
anytime soon.
“That’s all going to be
online,” Musser said.
Johnson, with Ritchie
Bros., said the company may
consider resuming in-per-
son auctions at their yards,
depending on customer
demand and public health
guidelines going forward.
For now, Johnson said
the online format is going
smoothly and garnering pos-
itive results.
“We continually evalu-
ate customer feedback and
try to make improvements
based on that customer
experience,” he said.